THE OLD MILL
THE TEAM
We are been lucky enough to be being helped in our quest to renovate and build by a select team of talented people. These are either friends or have become so despite them having to work with me, a task few would envy... it's fair to say I'm quite particular, difficult, annoying (delete as applicable). This page exists to say thank you to them and to give them a quick mention.
Pete - my oldest friend, that is not the friend I have known the longest, he's just old :-) He came down form Lancashire to work with us and stayed for 5 years before finally retiring in late 2022. Well deserved we say as he was 76 years old by then and that's no age to be carrying concrete blocks around. He was an electrician by trade, but could pretty much turn his hand to most things including brickwork and joinery... oh and digging... lots and lots of digging.
Samantha - lives on site in the cottage and looks after the animals when Helen is not around. She is a top class decorator and is gaining skills all the time mainly as there's no one else to do these things apart from us half of the time. It's fair to say she's becoming accomplished at roofing, plasterboarding, insulating, joinery, groundworks... the list is growing.
James - a professional builder who lends some genuine much needed worldly wise expertise to the whole affair. He also owns the most fantastic array of tools and equipment and I have major tool envy much of the time. His skillset is rather impressive too - I would list it all out, but there's genuinely not much he can't do, and I mean do to a very high professional standard. He's a truly nice guy with it too and it's fair to say since coming to work with us in August 2021 we have become good friends, well I hope he'd agree with that anyway.
Dave - a talented engineer and builder who works with James a lot of the time. He can undertake most construction tasks, has no fear of heights that I can detect and is particularly useful when something breaks on site as he can usually fix it.
Barry - another of James's contacts and a truly top quality bricklayer who can build beautiful straight walls or turn his capable hands to rebuilding brick arches on tapering and curved walls such as those that just happen to be found on our mill. The work he has done repairing the mill brickwork and getting it to blend in and look like it was always there is astonishingly good, and I'm a picky so and so, therefore that's high praise (I hope).
Peter & Catherine - these are the previous owners of The Mill and the people we bought it off. Since then we have become good friends and whilst not part of our team per se (luckily for them) they do provide much useful additional input to our ideas as well as suggesting those of their own (some of which we have adopted) as they lived here for 18 years of course. Indeed it was they who first suggested the notion of extending the bungalow part of the mill upwards to a second storey rather than outwards which is more in keeping with such mill buildings and that is what we have ended up doing so we owe them a big thank you for their ever useful input to our various projects.
Some pictures of the team in action.
NOTABLE SUPPLIERS
There are obviously a lot of suppliers and builders merchants we have used in our construction and renovation projects, but this section is reserved for those we feel have gone above and beyond their remit and would therefore happily recommend to others:
MB Woodcraft Ltd. - manufacturers of distinctive joinery, craftsman built hardwood furniture, windows and doors. Mariusz made our windows and doors for the mill and they are beautifully made items, the likes of which you just rarely see these days. I have seen some of his cabinet making and this too is beautifully executed with fantastic attention to detail. Highly recommended.
Anglian Pumping Services - suppliers of pumps and pumping solutions. Whenever we have a weird pumping requirement such as attenuation tanks, lake recirculating needs, boosted mains water supply etc. they have come up with a solution and not one that is outrageously expensive either. While they have a good online presence where they really score is the fact that they have people there that are happy to take a phone call and can come up with a solution from their experience and knowledge.
Condell Ltd. - this is a building supplies company that are only let down by their search engine rankings as they rarely come up on the top few pages, but they always seem to have the best deals for the likes of guttering, lintels, Velux windows etc.and they generally deliver quicker than anyone else too. Very helpful on the phone and good communication is the final reason they made it onto my special mention list.
Rose Building Supplies Ltd. - another builders' merchant and a recent addition to my recommended list. Super easy to get quotes over emails with quick turnaround and delivery times are excellent. Delivery drivers are very helpful too going above and beyond with moving materials on site.
Taylors Reclaims Ltd. - a reclaimed building materials company based in Wisbech, Cambridgeshire. A pleasure to deal with, well organised and happy to deal a little on price... what more could you ask for? Compared to some of the places we have ended up crawling around with disinterested staff Taylors is a breath of fresh air. All the bricks for the mill project came from them and they arrived all cleaned, stacked and in great condition just as promised.
TMT Grab & Skip Hire - we found these people when we needed a huge pile of hardcore grabbing lifting over a wall and taking away. Came when they said they would and gathered every last morsel up with the grab bucket and then a shovel... I was impressed. Since then we have used them for all sorts of not only disposal but delivery of loose loads where they pick up and drop off for us. Highly recommended as very helpful, reliable and not outrageous price wise either.
Anglian Metal Roofing - Simon and his team did the finishing lead work on the mill roof and the lead ridge work on the new build part of the mill. They are old school metal roofers who work on various conservation projects and do a fantastic job. Their lead welding is perfection and having tried it myself I can assure you it's not simple, best left to the professionals.
A&W Cushion Timber Merchants - Obtaining decent quality timber is nigh on impossible locally (it is often twisted, poorly cut, knotty etc.) so we use this company even though they are based a fair way away in Norwich. Their timber is generally super high quality and they can machine or source pretty much anything you require. Very helpful and responsive with quotes and requirements, and their prices are pretty much the best too which is a bonus.
Chris, Feb 2023